


Tags

by Joracwyn



Category: Stargate SG-1
Genre: Angst, Dog Tags, Episode: s06e16 Metamorphosis, Episode: s07e15 Chimera (Stargate), Episode: s07e16 Death Knell, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-29
Updated: 2018-10-29
Packaged: 2019-08-09 11:55:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,626
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16449467
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Joracwyn/pseuds/Joracwyn
Summary: A little piece of each other; a remembrance; a promise.





	1. Jack

**Author's Note:**

> The first part of this was posted on Tumblr in a discussion about whether Sam and Jack would have swapped dog tags. This is my take on when and how it might have happened, and then what happens next.

He thinks she's asleep. Her head is resting on his shoulder, its weight reassuring him that she's still here with him. But the sweat that soaks the fabric of his t-shirt is a constant reminder of the fate that awaits her if he can't think of a way out of here. And he's fresh out of ideas.

Then she shifts, her hands fumbling at the neck of her BDUs. She pulls her tags out, lifts them awkwardly over her head. Then she pushes them into his fist.

For a moment he stares at them, his brain refusing to process the meaning of her actions. Then he gets it. Fury and grief course through him so that he can barely grind out her name.

"Carter..." It's both a warning and a plea.

"Sir, just take them." She hasn't the energy for this fight. He knows it, so he doesn't argue. She has to save her strength. "You'll need them for Mark...my dad..."

He holds them in his hand as she drifts back into restless slumber, his thumb tracing her name over and over, the ridges entering his sense memory; Braille for his heart to read.

Later, when they're all miraculously alive and whole, and are never going to be bothered by Nirrti again, he puts his hand into his pocket and pulls them out, those little rectangles of metal.

They lie innocently on his palm. Tags that she wanted to mark her death, he is now returning to her as a symbol of her life.

But she doesn't take them. She stares at them, just like he had stared at them. Then her eyes, still haunted by the vision of the reaper she had confronted only hours ago, travel up to his. Slowly, she reaches up and curls his fingers around the objects in his hand. Then she pushes gently, until his fingers rest against his heart.

Not once do her eyes leave his.

She says nothing. Just like always, their silent language is more fluent than words could ever be.

With his other hand, he tugs his own chain free from his clothing and lifts it over his head. He holds it out to her in wordless appeal.

Almost reverently, she reaches up to take it from his hands, the metal still warm from his skin. Then she loops it carefully around her own neck, tucking it into the neck of her t-shirt. Her fingers trail over the fabric, down the line of the chain, resting on thetags where they lie between her breasts.

She takes a quick, deep breath and her teeth press lightly into her lip. Jack wants to run his fingers over those lips, wants his fingertips to learn the softness of her skin the way they have learnt the lines of her name.

He doesn't. Instead, he mimics her actions of a moment ago, until her tags lie against his chest, so he's wrapped in the remembrance of her life.

Still with no words spoken, they return home.

Carter is kept in the infirmary overnight for observations, whilst Jack is ordered off base. Early the next morning he returns, dressed in civvies, with a paper bag of croissants in one hand.

The other hand is stuffed deep into his pocket, where are hidden a pair of tags on a functional chain. His thumb warms the metal as it caresses the name engraved thereon, over and over, until the woman who gave them is back in his sight once more.

There's no place for them with his uniform, nowhere in his gear he wants to put them. But here, in the pocket of the jacket he wears home - the home that he inhabits without her, the home he wishes could be theirs - here they are safe.

But her name can only satisfy him so much. He needs to see the her, needs to reassure himself that these tags are not the only thing he has left of her, that everything he feared yesterday never came to pass.

But he has one extra stop to make.

Knocking on the door, he hears a thin voice call out, "Come in!"

The walls are lined with shelves. Neatly folded uniforms in plastic bags, boots that haven't yet earned their spit polish. A lanky airman, clipboard in hand, straightens when he sees the officer enter.

"Colonel O'Neill! Aren't you supposed to be... I mean, I heard it was close yesterday... Is Major Carter OK?"

"Yeah, Sergeant, she's OK. But it was a close one."

"So, what can I do for you, sir?"

"I need a new set of tags..."

 


	2. Sam

It becomes a little ritual. A superstition, if you will.

Jack's tags hang at the back of her locker, and as she gears up for every mission she slips one tag from the chain and tucks it into a pocket inside her uniform.

It's her memento of the time when his warm, strong embrace kept death's cold fingers from touching her. It has become her talisman.

At home, the tags live in a little bowl on her dresser. It's not like she has to worry that anyone will see them there. Her bedroom is pretty barren: even she spends more nights out of it than in her bed.

But her eyes fall on the unassuming silver chain as she's getting dolled up for her date with Pete and she freezes.

Maybe, just maybe, she won't be coming back to her bedroom alone.

The thought that Pete might see them, might pick them up in idle curiosity, might read the name inscribed, might ask her why she has her CO's dog tags in pride of place in her inner sanctum, fills her with panic.

There is nothing she could tell him. She can't tell him how they were given to her, that he has hers too. She can't tell him that they go everywhere with her, that she has the stupidest dependence that as long as they are with her, he is with her, and where he is, she's safe. It's barely something she can admit to herself.

So she runs out to her car in her stockinged feet and throws the tags into the glove compartment. At least, if he sees them there, she can say that the colonel dropped them in her car when she was giving him a lift home and she hasn't yet returned them. The lie won't come easily; she hopes she will never have to say the words out loud. But the lie will be easier to tell than the truth.

And she forces herself to forget them. Just like she's forcing herself to forget him as anything other than her commanding officer. Her teammate. Her friend, even.

And the date goes well. It's...humworthy.

Between the humming and planning for the trip to the alpha site with her dad, she does manage to forget. But when she's gearing up, her fingers reach for the chain...

...and it's not there.

Her heartbeat stutters and her thoughts come to a sudden halt. There's no time to retrieve the tags. She is going to have to go without them.

She tells herself that there is no reason to worry. It's completely illogical; a name on a piece of metal can't keep her safe, any more than throwing spilled salt over her shoulder can undo bad luck.

She ignores the dread nibbling at her insides.

And when she's running from the super soldier, and there's nothing left of her but dread, she doesn't remember what safe feels like.

In the end, of course, it's not his tags that protect her, it's the man himself. He puts his arm around her once more, only this time it's not to keep death's fingers away, it's to help her forget what that icy grip felt like, this time when he was almost, almost too late.

And as she rests her head on his chest, she thinks she can hear his tags - his new tags - clinking together under his clothes. It is only utter exhaustion that stops her from reaching up to touch them.

Back on Earth, her leg stitched, the minor cuts taped, herself showered and clean but still not quite able to rid herself of the lingering dread, she finds herself riding to the surface in the elevator with the colonel.

"Let's get you home, Carter," he says, his voice soft and low, soothing away the fear.

"Yes, sir," she says, resistlessly.

In the car park, he shepherds her towards his truck, but she rouses herself out of her apathy.

"I need something from my car, sir."

"OK, Carter, what is it?"

She shakes her head. "It's OK, sir, I'd like to get it myself."

He nods, frowning a little, but understanding that whatever it is, if it has made her show even this little interest, it's important to her.

"I'll meet you at the truck, then."

She heads to her car stiffly, slowly, and awkwardly twists herself in to reach into the glove compartment. They're there, glinting in the security lights. She snatches them up, her fingers tightening around them almost painfully.

She clutches them desperately in her hand the whole drive home. And as they gradually warm in her palm, reassurance starts to spread through her.

When she gets back to active duty she'll hang them again at the back of her locker. They can live there, for now. She has made the choice of Pete in her bedroom, but everywhere else in the galaxy, it'll be Colonel O'Neill watching over her.

Maybe it is superstition, but if it keeps her alive, she'll throw salt over her left shoulder, and knock on wood, and tuck his tags into her pocket for the rest of time.

 


End file.
